The Atlantic - How the Video-Game Industry Already Lost Out in the Gun-Control Debate.As it happens, that's just what happened to games (and popular media more generally) in the NRA's good guy with a gun response to the Newtown shooting. Guns aren't a factor in gun violence for the NRAŚrather, games, media, and law enforcement failures must take the blame. Once the terms of the debate are set like this (and set they very much were thanks to the over-the-top bravado in this press conference) then it's very hard to extract oneself from the debate without shifting the frame, without changing the terms of the debate.

I certainly believe that the White House would like nothing more than to see an end to mass gun murders in America's elementary schools. But the fact remains that gun violence takes place every day, all across this country, at a rate of dozens of deaths a day, and as the leading cause of death among African-American youth. But when the vice president establishes a task force on gun control and violence that includes the media industries that the NRA has once again chosen as their patsies after a particularly heinous and public example of gun violence, all it can do is shift attention away from guns.

IGN - Let's Talk About Violent Video Games.Distinctions between games for adults and those for kids are fairly clear these days, thanks to the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB). Formed in 1994, the ESRB rates all video games as a guide for parents similar to the way movies are rated by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). Games are rated ranging from E for Everyone and T for Teen to M for Mature, 17+.

There is a fundamental misunderstanding that games are only for children. This needs to change for the 'violence in games' dialogue to advance.

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sauron wrote on Jan 11, 2013, 12:03:Mass exterminations in totalitarian regimes have nothing at all to do with arms control in the US. What on earth are you thinking?

He doesn't think, he reacts. Particularly when he forgets to wear his tinfoil hat. Yes, I can see how well the average U.S. citizen would be defended from the entire U.S. military if it brought its entire weight to bear on the populace. Tanks, jets, missiles, drones, etc. oh yeah, fending them off with a few guns should be a cakewalk. And he's wrong as usual, plenty of people had guns back then, they were just outweighed by more people with more and bigger guns. Having guns certainly didn't help Cambodia when Nixon decided to engage in the illegal bombing of Laos, Cambodia and Thailand that killed and estimated 2 million people. Which proves my point entirely.

Meanwhile, back in reality...I'm a firm believer that guns aren't the problem. I do not believe anyone has a right to bear guns anymore than they have a right to drive - it's a privilege. If your argument is hunting then learn how to bow hunt. And people like RT are living proof there are far too many kooks and wackos out there with guns. How thorough is a background check when the feds are running 14,000 of them per day? I think psych tests should be mandatory to weed out potential psychopaths. Fines and punishment related to firearms misuse should be extremely stiff. In possession of or used in a crime should be an automatic 10 years for a first offense. Create a strong enough deterrent and then only the most hardcore outlaws will risk it.

The fact is guns do kill - that's their entire purpose - and they do it remarkably well. Just look at that knife attack in the school in China that same day as Sandy Hook. You can always run away or fight back against a knife or a club, not so with a gun. America's culture of pervasive paranoia is the true culprit though. That's why other countries have almost as many guns per capita and none of the gun violence. So until that changes nothing else will change regardless of what's banned or not.

"We choose the right to be who we are. We know the difference between the reality of freedom and the illusion of freedom."